That's what I said after the laptop slipped out of my hands and fell about a foot. My first thought was “please don't be broken” but that quickly changed to “what is that sticking out of the side of the computer.” Well, the computer still works which is a relief but when the computer fell it landed on its power cord and it snapped. I then turned off the computer to preserve battery life, and figured I'll see if we can find a new one the next day. Our friend Vova was more than willing to help us and he took us to a new market we have never seen before. It was an electronic market. I have never seen so many cell phones in one place in all my life. There was also a bunch of computer stores there as well. The third one we visited had universal AC adapters for laptops so of course I bought it. Thankfully, that problem is solved, now I need to be more careful.
We have been here for 4 months and you would think that we would have a grasp on the culture but we found out this week we still have a lot to learn...
On Wednesday we had plans to go interview a friend of ours from UBI as part of one my assignments and after that we had our Russian lesson. Our friend doesn't live in the city center so we had to take a bus to her place. We have never been there before so she just gave me directions and told me to get off when we saw a big Orthodox Church. That seemed easy enough but if you don't wave at the bus you want it drives right pass you. And so we missed the first bus we could have taken, but did catch the next one. While we were on the bus I realized I didn't really now how to say 'next stop please' so when we saw the church I attempted to say, "By the church, stop pzahlsta." But the driver gave me a very confused and unimpressed look. However other people wanted to get off there as well so it wasn't a problem.
While we were visiting with our friend I got a phone call. Its Vova, and he is attempting to communicate to me in Russian. I understand some of what he is saying and figure he wants Laurie and I to be his guests this evening. So we set a time and say our goodbyes. We finished our visit with our friend but before we left Laurie asked to use the washroom. Unfortunately, that building didn't have running water that day and so Laurie learned how to flush a toilet with a bucket of water.
Our next culture lesson came when we went to our Russian lesson. Our classroom is behind another so as we walk through the one we do so quietly because there is another tutor teaching and we do not want to be disruptive. We walked into our classroom and shut the door behind us to find that our tutor was not impressed with us. Basically she told us that it was rude for us to walk past that lady in the first classroom without saying hello and told us to go back and say hello. This was interesting because we haven't been formally introduced to this lady but since she is a friend of our tutor we should be friendly even if it is disruptive.
The rest of our Russian lesson went well and then we headed off to Vova and Lena's place. It was a hot day and we knew Vova and Lena would probably serve us tea to drink and we were wanting something cold so we bought a big Pepsi that we could all share on the way. As we get to their place I knock on the door but just then my phone rings. Its Vova and he asks where we are! I tell him we are at his house and asks him where he was. He said on the street which can also means outside. So we figured he was just running a little late and went to wait outside for him to return as I didn't really catch the rest of what he said. But as we were sitting outside and talking it occurred to us that maybe Vova had called not to invite us to be their guests but to invite themselves over as our guests. And it turned out that was exactly what had happened. I phoned Vova back to see what he was doing and he tells me he called a taxi to pick them up. And that works. Shortly afterwards they arrived in a taxi and then we all headed back to our place for a good visit.
Today, Laurie took the day off to rest and clean the house. Yesterday, we also had some friends over for dinner and so our place was needing attention. The picture above is of the juicy pork chops we had. Our place has a shashlik thing so I got Vova to show me how to 'bbq' Ukrainian style. As you can see there is a convenient holder for a poking stick.
The picture below shows what Bogdon, Tooly and I were up to today which is renovating one of the rooms at the church building. This was an interesting experience for me. The walls are a bit wavy and had many interesting layers under the wallpaper. We pulled down all the old wallpaper and scraped off all the 'stuff' underneath. Tomorrow, Bogdon and Vova are going back to put up the new wallpaper. I won't be able to help though since we made other plans previously.
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